


I'd save you but the world's bent

by Highsmith (quimtessence)



Series: TOG Femslash Fortnight 2021: Spring Solstice Edition [1]
Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Character Study, Crying, F/F, Gen, Good Quynh | Noriko, Hurt/Comfort, Jossed, Light Angst, Post-Movie: The Old Guard (2020), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Quynh | Noriko-centric, Reunions, Team as Family, The Old Guard Femslash Fortnight
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 13:35:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29901864
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quimtessence/pseuds/Highsmith
Summary: "Until the end." It's trite. She says it anyway.Andromache's eyes never leave her face as Quỳnh rises to her feet and approaches. She thought she'd be the startled and fearful animal here, its soft underbelly trembling in the wind of change, but Andromache looksterrified.And Quỳnh, well, she wants to touch her arm or pet at her hair, much shorter than when they last saw each other. There's parts of Andromache's history she has yet to hear. Wants to hear. Wants all of the stories, over and over again, until she can't distinguish them from her own.(Written for TOG Femslash Fortnight 2021: Spring Solstice Edition, Day 1: Reunions OR Confessions.)
Relationships: Andy | Andromache & Nile Freeman & Joe | Yusuf & Nicky | Nicolò & Quynh | Noriko, Andy | Andromache of Scythia/Quynh | Noriko, Booker | Sebastien le Livre & Quynh | Noriko
Series: TOG Femslash Fortnight 2021: Spring Solstice Edition [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2198619
Comments: 22
Kudos: 58
Collections: The Old Guard Femslash Fortnight





	I'd save you but the world's bent

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "16 Psyche" by Chelsea Wolfe.
> 
> The general vibe while writing this was 150% "The Waves Have Come" by Chelsea Wolfe. I mean, the lyrics, too, if you wanna go there...
> 
> I'm just now dipping my toes into AndromaQuỳnh, with more of a heavy serving of Quỳnh character study and Found Family Feels than initially anticipated, but the prompt kind of called for it. And definitely no Dragon Ladies here! #SorryNotSorry

There are five hundred and twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes in a year.

*

Under the water, Quỳnh finds out soon enough that she can hold her breath for less than two minutes, barely one if that. The spikes. The dread. The terror. A minute, if that.

A minute is a very long time.

*

Sound is too bright, the first hour out of the water, and it continues to remain too bright, too shrill, _too much_ for entirely too long. Disorienting, but only an obstacle in so much as it is unfamiliar.

Freedom, as Quỳnh sees it, is not as easy as she would have expected. Months pass, and, finally, she finds _him_.

Names. Names are important. Old and new. Booker. Joe and Nicky. Now Nile. A—

Andy.

*

After Booker's made himself a coffee and offered her a piece of fruit of all things, they sit across from each other at his little table in his kitchen that's both bright and grey. The fruit sits between them, a very green, lightly-speckled pear with a large stem. Quỳnh sits with her hands in her lap while Booker sips at his coffee and pretends he isn't throwing her surreptitious glances.

"You have questions, yes?" she offers as an opening.

"I would imagine not as many as you." But before they can engage in the sort of pointless conversation Quỳnh has rarely cared for, Booker asks, "Why are you here?" He then downs his coffee in three gulps, as if he needs to sober up as quickly as possible to make sure he's really listening to her answer.

Quỳnh doesn't blame him. They've been dreaming of each other for two hundred years, and in the last six months Quỳnh's had moments and _moments_ of not knowing if this is merely another dream in the seconds before another death. She's walking on pavement, but it feels like she's treading water only to sink back to the bottom.

"You were easy to find."

Ridiculously so. The alcohol obviously helps him dream less, but she hasn't resorted to avoiding her dreams since she's left the water. But this has had the unfortunate result that she's plagued with images of his daily life, his anger and his pain and his loneliness, while the only other person she could be seeing when she closes her eyes at night appears to her less and less.

Nile Freeman. Officially dead. Smart enough to create identities far too hard to locate even with current technology. Quỳnh's a quick learner, but Nile's too far ahead.

Hence Booker.

She tells him so.

He sighs. "Of course I know where they are."

Whatever he's leaving unsaid Quỳnh finds she doesn't have the patience to drag out of him with honeyed words. "Will you tell me?" Before he can offer up meaningless words about regret and family and whatnot, she adds, "I need to see them," in a voice she doesn't quite recognise but is decidedly her own.

That seems to have an immediate effect. His shoulders descend from around his ears, and they spend the next hour discussing logistics. It's an hour during which she doesn't have to think about what she's going to do.

(Booker doesn't ask her. Later, he'll say he heard it in her voice, that he knew she was intent on returning home and nothing more, but she knows it's not true. How could _he_ know when _she_ didn't?)

*

She's always been decently clever. More of a fighter than a planner, but not averse to thinking through a problem for however long it took to reach either a solution or the realisation that there wasn't one.

Nile should be first. A sign of good faith. The dreams never helped with finding them, but stopping them altogether means she's willing to give up on even that one speck of hope. Nile will know this.

They recognise each other from across the street, a planned coincidence Quỳnh has orchestrated for the few seconds needed for Nile to see her and mouth _You?_

Quỳnh nods, and she waits, and Nile doesn't disappoint. (Quỳnh tries not to, either.)

*

They must talk. Words are exchanged, certainly. Nile leads her to their safehouse, the one Quỳnh already knew about from Booker, but the dread never stops. Her stomach is by her feet the entire time, and waves lap at her heels even though they're in a quaint suburb with tall gates and flowery stems that lift themselves out onto the street.

Nile leads her around the back into an empty kitchen. Asks if she wants coffee. Quỳnh says, "This obsession with it is a bit troubling," and Nile snorts loudly, her subsequent laugh oddly warm.

For a moment, Quỳnh can't hear the sound of waves anymore.

She sits. She knows it's polite. Nile doesn't actually fetch her coffee, but she does bring her a glass of water with two perfect ice cubes floating against its walls. Quỳnh can see her reflection in it and through it.

The table is a shiny, dark wood. Quỳnh lays her hand flat on its surface. The wood is smooth against her palm. Coolly uninterested in what is happening to the people around it, as all objects are.

"I haven't said a word," Nile says, and Quỳnh is grateful.

They don't have to wait for long for the front door to open and close, rowdy sounds of chatter filtering in, getting closer.

Then the kitchen door opens, Yusuf and Nicolò smiling at each other, all teeth, filing in first, only to stop in their tracks, the door banging closed behind them.

Yusuf's face changes with astonishment, but not much else, which is especially jarring given the tears, sudden and particularly wet-looking. Quỳnh has a moment where she thinks, _how silly tears are_ , until she feels them falling down her own face. (How silly all things are, especially people.)

Her hands squeeze into fists by her side, clenching tightly, short nails pinching the tender skin of her palms before she unclenches and feels it knit back together. Her cheeks are very warm beneath the tears. Nicolò, standing very still, appears wavy and mangled for the long moment before her eyes clear. The understanding she finds there is startling, but not unwelcome.

She hardly hears the door opening or closing again, but her body turns at the waist towards the sound. Andromache's face renders realisation painfully visual.

English has always felt strange in her mouth, but it's what she has now. What she's using to _make sure_ she's understood. Another part of her doesn't want to breathe a word. Wants to remain quiet and start walking, leave, _run_.

"Until the end." It's trite. She says it anyway.

Andromache's eyes never leave her face as Quỳnh rises to her feet and approaches. She thought she'd be the startled and fearful animal here, its soft underbelly trembling in the wind of change, but Andromache looks _terrified_.

And Quỳnh, well, she wants to touch her arm or pet at her hair, much shorter than when they last saw each other. There's parts of Andromache's history she has yet to hear. Wants to hear. Wants all of the stories, over and over again, until she can't distinguish them from her own.

But she stops when she's not yet close enough to touch, uncertain if she's ever going to get them. If this is where their line finally ends.

"Remember?" she asks, earnestly, painfully hoping against hope.

In her arms, Andromache feels simultaneously solid and warm like water never could be. Her arms encircle her at the small of her back, and her tears against the hollow of Quỳnh's neck could boil her alive if she let them.

She wants to let them.

(Later, Andromache will finally become Andy, just plain Andy, warm in her arms _always_ and looking at her as if the sun has finally risen after hundreds of years. And Quỳnh will feel both embarrassed and elated at the looks, the touches, nothing like the heaviness of water, pure human touch like she's been craving for so long. They'll talk until they're parched and laugh at nothing and cry at everything, and this strange new world will seem less terrifying, because Andromache has never scared her, so why should this century do? She'll be Andy, but Quỳnh will always be herself. It's the name she carried for most of their time together, and she never wants to part with it or shed it for another. And hearing it from Andy's mouth will feel like coming home.)

She lets them.

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't read the comics, and I haven't really been in tune with the AndromaQuỳnh side of the fandom, so my characterisation skills are still in progress and I'm still working out stuff, but I'd love to know what you thought. Comments and kudos greatly appreciated.
> 
> <3
> 
> I am also on Tumblr [@rhubarbdreams](https://rhubarbdreams.tumblr.com/).


End file.
